


Thunder Valley

by Born In Captivity- Ineligible to Release (Jashasedai)



Series: Alternate Universe - Tame Racing Drivers [20]
Category: Motorcycling RPF, motocross - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe- Tame Racing Drivers, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-16
Updated: 2017-05-16
Packaged: 2018-11-01 11:12:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10920645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jashasedai/pseuds/Born%20In%20Captivity-%20Ineligible%20to%20Release
Summary: In an AU where a secret species is used as Racing Riders, not everything Racing Riders do is race.Bradley Cox and his Racing Rider travel to South Africa to film a promotional video.





	Thunder Valley

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in the Tame Racing Driver AU. Read the series summary.

**Thunder Valley- 2014**

 

The sky was cloudy today. The cameraman said that would make for better shots. He didn't look unhappy. The producer running the interview for the Red Bull website was looking at his phone and didn't look up to where Bradley was standing with his arms crossed, looking out at the track. When he did, Ryan stepped a little closer to Bradley and shot the producer a look that was almost a glare.

  
[Can't stand that guy. He's a jerk when he does my interviews.] Ryan signed to Bradley. The producer and the cameraman couldn't speak sign, so it was better on a track than whispering. You couldn't whisper and be heard over the bikes. On big race days, you could barely yell and be heard over the bikes. Gesturing was better. Unless the guy gesturing to you was beyond the edge of your helmet, or you were passing to fast to see what he was gesturing, and taking your hands off the handlebars to sign was out of the question.

  
Bradley pointed to himself and gave a thumbs up. [I agree.]

  
The man who ran the track stared at him and then shook his head. He didn't understand the gestures, either. Bradley hadn't known the sign language the last time he'd been here, before he went to work for Red Bull. Now Red Bull had brought him back to interview him about his home track. They were going to shoot some footage of him monstering the course for the website.

  
The only problem was, Bradley Cox wasn't going to be the one riding the course. He didn't really ride anything anymore.

  
Not since he'd gotten to Red Bull.

  
Not since he signed the deal to let someone else race under his name, do all the riding, while he signed autographs and gave interviews, and made money. Oh, there was a lot of money. And it wasn't as though he wouldn't be ALLOWED to ride today, but no one would be filming him, even though he'd raced here for years, and had mastered the track.

  
The guy who would be filmed today had never even seen this track. That was what had Bradley worried.

  
Two guys came out of the trailer in race gear. One, exactly Bradley's height and build, and wearing the helmet everyone associated with his name, came and stood beside him. The other, in generic orange gear with an occasional Red Bull logo, stood beside Ryan. Ryan Dungey was the senior rider who had agreed to accompany Bradley on this trip.

  
Well, really it was Bradley's partner that needed to be accompanied. Red Bull considered him valuable property.

  
When Bradley had arrived at Red Bull, he'd been very surprised to find out that almost every motorsports athlete in the world was not what they seemed to be. They were all two people. One, a regular guy who drove to practice every day and home every night and waved to fans and had a normal, if somewhat celebrity life. The other, a guy who was anything but regular, not even human, in fact, who lived in the team motorhome on race weekends, drove insanely fast, and then returned to a stable owned by the team, to practice and wait for the next race.

  
Bradley's partner couldn't even speak, that was why he needed to be accompanied, and the team didn't trust Bradley, who'd only been partnered with him for a little over a year and a half, to be able to handle any difficulty that came up.

  
Like anyone finding out under any circumstances. It could not be allowed. If the public knew that the teams (all of them, not just Red Bull) were keeping intelligent creatures as working livestock, they would freak. The stables even referred to the Racing Drivers, or Racing Riders in Bradley's case, as stallions and mares, and the place they lived as a stable. That was what had led Bradley to make a slightly rude mistake when he first started working with his partner.

  
The paperwork had a place for a name. The Racers went by serial numbers until they were old enough to start their careers, and then the human got to pick a name for them. Bradley had picked Mustang, thinking it sounded like a good, tough name for a stallion. When other human matches for Racers heard the name, they all looked extremely uncomfortable. He found out why when he got to know "Mustang" and realized he was just as smart and capable and a person as Bradley. The name had stuck, though everyone called him Pony, and then taken to calling him Show Pony.

  
So here were Bradley and Pony, about to do a track walk with Ryan and his partner. The Rider standing there leaning against Ryan (Riders loved to be in physical contact with their partners and friends) was named Goldenrod. If he took his helmet off, it would be impossible to tell he and Ryan apart. The same was true of Bradley and Pony. You had to be able to pass for your Rider, in case they got in an accident, or the public saw their face. Mostly, they kept their helmets on, when they were around a track.

  
[I hate this weather.] Goldenrod grumped. [Rain or not, the sky should make up it's mind.] He couldn't speak, Racers all made sort of mechanical sounds when they made noises, but all Racers gestured. It was their language, humans just learned it.

  
[It's perfect.] Pony contradicted him.

  
Goldenrod turned his helmeted face to the younger stallion. A little growling noise like a car revving came from behind the visor.

  
[Let's not have any getting chest to chest and challenging one another for dominance, here.] Ryan put his arm in front of Goldenrod. [Not in front of the media.]

  
As one, the 4 helmets turned to the track manager, the camera man and the producer. The producer made a 'move it along' gesture, that in Racer sign language mean 'help, my tires aren't getting grip.' The four burst into laughter. Bradley started down the track. Racers really only had to go over a track once to learn it. They had the advantage over humans that way.

  
[So, this first corner's pretty tight, if we were racing, you'd want to be sure to get into it before the other guys.] They did this for every track, though most of them Bradley didn't know. Pony walked to the burm at the outside of the corner and tested it out. He could tell just by looking exactly where the right line was. Sometimes Bradley felt like just an extra brain for Pony to keep information in. It was even an old catchphrase among the Racers, "A Racer and his match are one Racer in two bodies."

  
Goldenrod went over to him and argued about where the best line was.

  
Pony threw up his hands in mock exasperation.

  
Bradley was glad the stable had sent Ryan. He and Goldenrod were the pair they got along with the best. Even though they were older, they didn't mind Bradley and Pony being their own people and finding their own limits. Some of the older riders weren't like that. Red Bull wasn't the stable Pony had been born at, it was just the team they were riding for. He grew up in the same stable as Goldenrod. All the Riders grew up in one of the two Racing Rider stables. All the big stables housed mostly Racing Drivers. Older riders usually wanted to make sure the younger ones treated them with respect. Usually that mean submitting instantly and doing what you were told. Goldenrod and Ryan weren't like that.

  
Which was good, because older riders who were used to being grovelled for usually had the hardest time when the younger riders started to surpass them, and Bradley and Pony were planning on surpassing a LOT of older riders. There were some Championship trophies with their name on them in their future. Actually, the name on them would be Bradley's but the influence among other Racers, and that was how Racers measured rank, would be all Pony's. It was a fair split, considering.

  
They finished their track walk amidst a wildly gestured discussion about gravel, and Bradley and Ryan stood off to the side of the track while Pony got on his bike. He kissed the gastank, and the filming began.

  
Filming motorsport isn't like most people imagine. Pony didn't take off from the start line and just ride lap after lap. He took off from the start line and rode about 30 yards, and then came back and did it again, about 15 times. Then he rode down the straight 15 times, while the cameraman found the perfect angle to lie in the mud and film him. Then corners, then jumps. Then try it again because the cows in the background weren't in an appealing configuration.

  
This was NOT how Pony liked to ride, and a large part of Bradley's job, other than translating the producer's orders, was to keep him from getting frustrated. He told him jokes while the cameraman reset all his equipment. They discussed his lines from a racing perspective.

  
Bradley just ignored 90% of the bullshit the producer said about things like 'having him ride as though the jumps make his heart light' or 'tell him to ride as though this is where his roots are.'

  
'Good jump, did your landing feel square?' Bradley asked instead, when the man tried to get him to have Pony land as though he were stomping on the chances of a rival.

  
"He says he will stomp them extra hard this time," Bradley told him. Geeze, no wonder Ryan hated this guy. What a load of shit. He rolled his eyes behind his visor.

  
When filming was finally done, for Bradley and Pony, anyway, the producer went to go film the hillside dramatically, and the 4 guys could ride. Racers would always be better than humans at their prefered sports, but Bradley and Ryan had lots of experience of their own. They were the ones who had actually been riding, up until the Riders were old enough to start their public careers, at about 14. Bradley's 85cc championships were all his own. They weren't great competition for the Riders, but they were good competition for each other, and could still keep the two specialists on their toes.

  
After riding was done, at the end of the night they all sat around the trailer Red Bull had sent for them (The Riders couldn't risk being spotted in a hotel.) Pony loved hot chocolate, and because he had to stay at racing trim, he didn't get to have it very often. Bradley felt like he'd earned it, today, being so patient with that dopey producer and all the stopping and starting. He sat next to him on the couch. This had been a pretty good day. All the days he got to spend with his best friend were better than the days he wasn't there.

  
And in the future, their Championships waited for them.

**Author's Note:**

> Real People don't belong to me.
> 
> This story is fiction and is no reflection on anyone in it. The story does belong to me, as does the AU in which it is set.


End file.
